I animated the Transformers cartoon...in blender 

The thing that always gives it away as 3D is that the perspective is perfect. If only there way to have the model randomly deform at some parts to get that hand drawn look.

Kinda reminds me of when early 2000’s cartoons would have random cgi shots inserted and hope nobody would notice. Back then extremely obvious but this is simply impressive 👏

Awesome animation! But imo, it doesn't really look anything like the 80s cartoon, it has its own style.

0:01 the wheels on the arms and the head give away that its not from the show

Looks like you had help from the matrix of leadership i can say that you've got the touch . You've got the power

Believe it or not. this obvious 3D model is actually a 3D model. I mean. nice work, but no this doesn't look like 2D at all.

You made something that looks nice, but it still doesn't look anything like the original cartoon. The model is wrong. Good job though.

It looks great! I think what could have sold the effect more would be to use brigher colors to make them stand out more from the background. Either way it still looks great!

Fans of transformers are pretty bad at not critisizing things for not looking exactly how they remembered them looking as a child. This is a cool project and it looks good. Does it perfectly simulate hand drawn Toei animation? No. But thats not exactly the goal here. This concept can and should be pursued further

Damn whyd you do animated prime like that😂

Ahhh good old TF Earth Wars game mode

The Thumbnail wasn’t 3D at all, but the actual transformation in the video was pretty nice.

great work! i’m an animator/video guy and grew up watching this show on old CRT tvs. a couple pointers if you like: Main one is, even though it was “low-resolution”, it was analogue. that meant no pixels. no pixels meant we didn’t really see “aliasing” the same way we do now on low res images. The TVs had a bright glow, and the image was just blurrier than what we’re used to now. so a blur and very subtle bloom effect would give you a more accurate look than just low res pixels. How “pixelated” anything looked back then was more related to the TV’s CRT itself. some were sharper than others. if you saw any details like that, it would have been the actual RGB dots! Secondly, since it was all hand drawn, you can see subtle wobble and inconsistency in the shapes and volumes. you could add a little “dirt” to some of the animation moves, and maybe try an *extremely* subtle warp deform (like geometry displace or line art noise) that changes on the same frames as the “drawings”. they may sound like trivial details but I think you’d be surprised at how much that can sell it. Again, very nice! thanks for sharing :)

There are three big giveaways for me. Firstly, the Model is still a bit too detailed, as it is actually based on a more modern show. It gave the look away immediately as it contrasted harshly with the background. Second, older shows don't really match the cell shaded look. Two tone colors were usually reserved for animated movies, and as such the shows weren't shaded, making everything look flat. The cell shading actually makes the look more obvious rather than a flatter tone. Finally, the model shifts a bit on the 2d background rather than staying stationary, which is probably a result of the camera. As others have pointed out it looks like when cartoons replace cars and other characters with CG to get more detailed movement, rather then a 2d shot. Ignoring that, this is really well animated and presented, and the process was really interesting, even though the end result didn't necessarily achieve what you wanted it to do.

Great job. the model reminds me of mp-10. The project reminds me of the Transformers Devestation game

I think the cel shading actually makes it stand out more as a 3D model, perhaps there is a filter you could put over the model?

there is no reson why this should not be viral this is a great animation

I think the end result came together well! One thing that was always going to prevent it from being more believable was the much more complex/high poly 3D model. A model that was simple like the OG cartoon would have fit the scene better, but it would have been much more challenging to animate since it would require morphing and perspective based animation needs compared to a model that was designed for both modes as well as transformation.

As a Transformers fan, I love it - but it doesn't read as 2D and sadly I can't think of a way to stop it doing so. Part of what I think works with the 2D look is that the lines around them aren't as bold as you''ve made, and they're often coloured similarly to the thing they're outlining. This might be because of blurring, etc. It also might not even be truly possible as most of the time, the character model and vehicle model were two different things altogether. This read like a remake of the old stuff and getting rid of the imperfections... which, is still great... I'd love to see a side by side re-make of a scene or two like this. :)

Why didn't you just model Optimus Prime from the get go? Everything is awesome but the model you downloaded, it's not bad, but it doesn't match the 80's cartoon style at all which is arguably the most important thing.

This is a good and comprehensive BHS retouching the Earth Wars Optimus Prime game model which looks better that’s the game’s "G1 Core" cel and outline shading skin.

You shouldn't use a VHS filter of Aliasing as when watching broadcast TV back in the day didn't have that issue, that is a modem problem when digitizing analog TV. As for the VHS filter, those shows weren't on consumer VHS recorders but were distributed over analog C band satellite broadcast and the local stations that purchased the syndicated show would have recorded the analog C band broadcast to the studio recorders, which were high quality betamax or other high quality recorders. Back in the 1980s the show looked great on a CRT TV.

Such cartoons didn't have a bad quality look back then as they were experienced on old tube analog TVs. The ideal should be to reproduce how they felt like at the time which is not the same feeling as watching smaller screens resolution content on modern high resolution displays.

I just can't believe that any style of animation is done with Blender. There's too much talent out there. Thank you to all the animators for your skills, time, patience 😊.

It looks more like a point and click adventure style on the windows xp/nintendo ds.

Earth wars optimus prime

Their is actually a really easy way to rig characters like this but it is kind of hard to explain. You can select parts,in edit mode using L then if you select vertices on the left hand side under the transforms menu you will see how much each bone is affecting the mesh. Their is a green triangle icon if you click that you can easily set the mesh to the correct bones.

if you don't appreciate Transformers Animated, you don't deserve any thumb up.

I believe you forgot about color palette. Today we use 24bpp images but in the 80's they used to be much lower like 8bpp so they had much lower variances of color other than that it looks great

Didn’t help that the background seemed to blurry. Even if u argue it’s out of focus. Just made the model stand out more.

Should’ve used to transformers devastation model but still… Tis nice

Biggest giveaway, (besides the model not matching the show), the draw lines are all the same thickness. Needs to have variation of how thick they are to mimic hand drawn

toei did the first season, a majority of the second season, and only a few episodes of the third season, most non-toei episodes were done by AKOM or other studios like studio look

"This shot from the 80s show, that's clearly not from the 80s show, and looks totally 3D, is actually 3D believe it or not." Ummm I can tell pal

0:06 We could tell. Looks too clean.

Every single frame was hand drawn, in 3D all of the lines on him are perfectly straight with no errors, that's the only problem, the imperfections make 2D Amazing becuz you can see the work put into there

The click bait is amazing

As an old Earth Wars player I instantly recognized the model, but I didn't know they were free! 😅

this was a lot of fun, i learned a few new things. if you even want some collab let me know. Subscribed

Fun fact : the optimus model the guy use is the same models used in transformers earth wars

I WISH that the WAR FOR CYBERTRON trilogy on Netflix was animated in this style. Your work is the perfect marriage of the look of the 80s' cartoon but updated with modern sophistication. Would love to see more like this.

The biggest issue I find with 3d emulating 2d is that often it feels like even if it's animated in 2's, its often animated as if it was in 3D, but then each alternate frame is snipped out, so it still feels like 3d animation, except choppier, which I feel is something your final result suffers from. It's a good try though, I'm always interested when people are trying to capture the 2d feel in 3d. Also something 2d animation does a bunch is break the 2's rule, especially for certain movements. If it's a quick movement or detailed animation they will often go to 1's.

Great animation & video. And G1 is the best… I know, I know. But please…, no jonning on TFA… I loved that damn show 😔

Subscribed! And awesome work! Been wanting to get into blender at some point (likely after I am done with high school). Most 3D experience I have making posters in SFM so it seems a bit overwhelming... But this channel is motivating me to put the time to learn it.

Tbh it gives the same feel as dragon ball fighterz where it looks 2d but there is just something off where you can tell it couldn’t be from the show

For That Zoom Out Camera It Would Actually Be Simple Just By Keyframing The FOV To Zoom In Or Out Whereas His Zoom Out Shot Actually Has His Camera Moving Instead Of Just Zooming

Nice job, but I would remove many bits from the 3D models like the wheels on the hands, as its really far from the original G1 prime look

The highest resolution we got in the 80s was 520 lines ! Signal was analogic, not digital back then and had to fit the PAL / NTSC standards.

You got the touch AND the power!

4:48 I specify, because an occasional fan of Transformers can’t know, but Transformers animated is undoubtedly the best Transformers series ever released. Apart from that, very nice work, it makes me think of the animated series Transformers Cyberverse but almost better, we hope that Hasbro hires you for a new animated series Transformers 🤞🏾🤞🏾🤞🏾

I think something that would enhance the animated look is going away from straight up only animating 2s and leave out extra frames for fast movements. Like, a fast leg movement will probably be done between a single frame switch with just a smear frame visible. I know smear frames a hard when 3d animating but they are possible and you can get away with a lot of low res boxes used for one frame smear frames. Another thing is idle animation. this isn't applicable here, but animator basically dont animate the characters at all when they're standing still. With 3d animation we tend to and a slight sway to our characters that looks good but is really taking away from the drawn look. Complete freeze frames feel wrong to do but add so much authenticity in my opinion. Of course if you're going for a hybrid look this is all irrelevent, I just want to give some tips for getting more hand drawn animation accuracy :)

Cant wait for more content!

always good to find a fellow transformer animator. I mainly go for the bayverse look but i love the technical process of doing 3D in 2D styles

It's pretty awesome what you did there! The whole damn show could probably be recreated in 3D with relative ease. You could totally make the look work. You certainly know what you're doing with the shading and grain, all that. Now, here's some more opinionated stuff: I don't think the particular vision of Prime's transformation here works in favor of his character. He jumped like he was someone relatively lightweight and nimble like Jazz or Sideswipe. You'd expect Prime to turn into a sports car and not a truck. I don't know, I personally see Optimus Prime transforming in a less acrobatic fashion because he's meant to be HEAVY. Of course, you're working with the transformation scheme where Optimus' waist rotates for the alt mode which I've never quite understood. On a different note: I once experimented with making good looking transformations in the G1 fashion. I ended up creating the robot mode as a standalone character, and whatever transformation the robot would do would've been kind of a mock-up. His limbs would go through the motions but not really morph into the alt mode. Instead, the model would change somewhere in between into the alt mode model and maybe have some very basic transformation to indicate which part is going where. Of course that's not as impressive as the entire transformation, but in the G1 context it might work well.

When it comes to camera movement, you have to export the clip first before adding in the camera movement, so there's perspective change & the image remains 2D.

The thing is it really lacks post processing, because it looks off with the background, you could render png sequence with transparent bg of prime and then add color correction with the shadows to match the background, then it would be great

There's nothing wrong with this. It's a great 3D rendition of Prime that was clearly animated with great precision. The problem is in the claim that you're trying to make it look like the original 2D cartoon, which a 3D animation will never look like. It doesn't look 2D at all. It's the intention that annoys people, and frankly, knowing this is your intention does diminish your hard work.

Making 3d look 2d is an unbelievably complicated field of animation, doubly so if you're also trying to capture a more vintage look. For a solo animator, you handled it pretty well, but it still looks far from the original cartoon. This is mostly due to the higher detail and more modern proportions of the model you chose. You might've had an easier time in retrospect if you chose to start with the Prime model from Devastation instead of the Earth Wars one. Devastation already had a near perfect recreation of the original cartoon's artstyle, which would have saved you some time adjusting and simplifying the model. Another thing that made the final animation look off was that you made it look a little too good. You got a lot of details correct like the simple camera movements that some people miss when trying to do this style of project, but the character animation itself was too complex. All of those extra flourishes and secondary movements you added just aren't the sort of thing that you'd see on a 40 year old children's tv show. These shows were animated quickly and without a huge budget, so they tended to keep things simple. With that said, it seems like this was a bit of a departure from what you have experience with, so I'd say it still turned out pretty good all thing considered.

I hope one day I can mess around with this program. I want to build a cool transformers intro.

For what it's worth, the highest resolution in the 80s was 35mm. This would have been telecined to 1" masters which would be virtually (video) noise free. Some of the episodes have been remastered in HD from the original film prints, while some originate from broadcast masters and were upscaled from there, but the upscaling algorithms used would have been recent and much more sophisticated than stretching a 640x480 image out to high res. The original tape image wouldn't have had aliasing anyway since that was captured in lines rather than pixels and I don't think there's really much aliasing in the analog domain (at least as we'd think of aliasing). Low analog resolution just doesn't look very much like low digital resolution. So to match the look, really what you'd want is more film grain and then to restrict the colors to NTSC, but adding video noise is a red herring. To the extent there are artifacts from enlargement, I think it's really more because the original cels weren't particularly large, so the character drawings lacked even more detail and the linework was crunchier and more erratic (setting aside the absence of anything approaching perfect geometry). Also, maybe it's my imagination, but the zoom out seems to reveal that the character is floating a bit on the BG. I'd recommend rendering with no zoom, and then adding the zoom afterwards -- zooming in or out and having the level of detail remain fixed is a hallmark of this sort of animation anyway.

Oh i think a little extra fakery would be par for the course. When in bipedal mode, the lack of intricate detail which doesn't lend itself to being hand drawn at 6-12 frames per second, is offset by slightly different geometry, which is less straight and flat square, more human-like, to give the characters character, this is just instinctively how an animator woud draw it. This doesn't work too well for the vehicle mode though, which needs very straight cuboid shapes that adjoin perfectly at the seams. It could be emulated by having shape keys one for bipedal mode and one for vehicle mode so the actual geometry is different between them, morphing during transformation.

I know you’re not hating on TFA

Predacon Megatron’s reaction:”Excellent,yes!”

I noticed that the model and vehicle mode are similar to Transformers' Earth-Wars Optimus and it looks fairly good compared to it.

Bandai: "Fuck it, lets make them obviously 3d with the most obsequious style imaginable. This guy: "Yo but I'm pretty sure I can do OG animation in 3d better than you can."

Wow! That's a lot of work but I think it was worth it!

You could up the Focal Length on the camera and zoom out to get a flatter look. I liked this shot though, would look cool in a reanimate collab or something.

Random pop-up in my feed, but since I clicked, I can note a few things. First, thumbs up on the model itself and its movement! Remember that the source of G1 is not video, but film. Animation drawings can go as low as 8 fps or up to the full 24, at any time, and the main reason it's 12 most of the time is 'cuz it's cheaper! Unless movement is incredibly subtle, modern animation that utilizes CGI to give you 12 2D drawings per second ON PURPOSE seems like a really bad idea, even if I'm otherwise impressed with shows like "X-Men '97". When artifacts are added for authenticity, it only needs to be for film (usually grain, tiny spots and even splicing tape between shots), and remember that even if frames are drawn at 12 per second, each of those 12 is actually "photographed" for 2 frames of film (3 film frames if drawn at 8 per second); Artifacts still need to run at 24fps. VHS "effects" don't apply because other mediums of the time (laserdisc, broadcast master tapes, etc) didn't have the same "imperfections", and resolution considerations do not apply, because, being film footage of animation cels on painted backgrounds, it could go as high as Blu-ray res if you wanted, then if you wish, downscale it after final render to emulate a telecined 29.97 fps TV broadcast at most.

If you spilt the color then use the color ramp for each channel you can use color lighting

I don't think 3D modeling would be the problem, you could definitely keep the "fine details" as it's aesthetically superior. Look at Unicron in Transformers the Movie (1986) for proof. Next time try using thinner weight on the line work, connect everything (some spots are empty) and brighter colors.

Optimus should have longer legs. He had very heroic stature, like a Gundam or a superhero.

yeahit works pretty well 87render has already made 2 or 3 short films in this style

this looks a lot like a combo of G1 with the more modern by2s mediums, but that only makes it more endearing

It reminds me a lot of the animation in Cybertron!

I admire the work but it Still looks completely 3d. It'll be easier to just hand draw it. Perosnally I think ai generators like sora will be able to churn out something like the original tf movie in the very near future with just a few text prompts.

Loved it i would sugest blocking that would help with the transformstion like what thry did with the cartoon also researching 2d animations are done in 1 2 and 2s and 3s 3s are for faster 2d animations

How long do you work in blender mate? Cause this is insane

That didn't look like the 80s series at all

nice work. The skinning part was interesting- even though it's a bit more work I'd probably still parent the mesh with empty groups and just use the "assign" button for each mesh island and corresponding bone

Looks very cool! I think the final model is perhaps still too detailed compared to the original show. Also, the animated shows had a somewhat lower contrast and saturation (mostly brighter shadows from what I can tell), hope this helps :)

The Aliasing wasn't there in the original airing. Its a consequence of bad encoding in the digital version, which hasn't been remastered.

Nice job man, I hope to learn more Blender, just one thing to add here, old TV shows and things didn't use "resolution" as we do now, so there wasn't like "pixelating scenes" or something like that, I can't remember rn how it was called, but you can see also in photo that definition was neat, but nothing related to pixels per inch.

Are you planning on doing this for the whole g1 movie???? Cause this would be epic!!!!!

You should watch the Starscream OVA 4K by 87Render.

You are getting better and better sir! I am a day 1 fan! Keep going!!

It looks really REALLY amazing, I love the style a LOT, but the only thing I could really say is y'know, sound, and the model for robot mode having the wheels on the arms and the feet hanging in the back for the truck mode, other than that, perfect replication!!! 😁

Nice animation with an even nicer how to do guide.

something you can do with rigging models like this in particular instead of automatic weights use empty groups, you can then just select the individual parts and apply them to the bones might take longer but it provides the best results imo

Looks interesting, man!

Video titled "Why is our profession 'the work of madmen'?" As 'a person who animation graduate' . 😄

This gives me strong transformers energon vibes. This may be a hot take, but in my personal opinion, 3d cel shaded animation is my favorite animation style that I wish was more commonly used in cartoons and video games

I think rather than simply animating on 2s, you need to use hold frames to freeze the pose at key frames of action. Watch the original cartoon frame by frame, there will be holds varying from 2 to several frames.

Sorry to say this but I knew that model was from the Transformers Earth Wars game as soon as I saw it, still impressive job 👍👍👍

that's the model from earth wars, the mobile game

I was waiting for the popping and locking transformers sound.. other than that it's utter perfection!

🤖🛻 Great Project, Good Luck! (SoundWave would be another iconic choice to start with - and more doable than Megatron, who will be difficult.)

probably said before but the transformers devastation model would probably be best for recreating the G1 cartoon

It looked 3D but stull super good result

the camera move you did is not a zoom, it is a dolly and totally works opposite to the 2D effect you’re attempting because it’s messing with the 3D position and perspective.

Truly outstanding! Well done!